HGTV star Ben Napier got emotional during season 7 of their show, “Home Town.” The Laurel, Mississippi, residents bought a “home in the country” so their two daughters — 4-year-old Helen and 1-year-old Mae — would have a place to play. The Napiers want a place where they can unwind and be away from the rest of society.
Erin wants to make the most out of the time she has with her girls.
“The thing is, we only get 18 summers with our children,” she said in a clip that was posted to HGTV’s Instagram page. “That was one of the first things someone told me when Helen was born and I think about of it all the time. And it flies.”
“We need a place where we can be quiet and slow down and make memories because if we’re working all the time, we’ve missed it,” she continued. “We don’t have a lot of time.”
Ben’s eyes began to water, and Erin leaned over to help her husband wipe the tears away.
“This is really dusty in this house,” he joked. “It’s been vacant for a little while.”
Instagram users in the comments section loved the advice Erin gave.
“I wish someone had told me that when my girls were little,” read one of the most popular comments.
“So true. It does fly by. But you’ll still have that beautiful farm for your grandchildren,” a second agreed.
“I get it,” a third person wrote. “I wished for them to grow up one day, and they did. Oh, to go back.”
The Napiers Grew Up Playing Outside
The Napiers loved to have fun outside as children.
“For me growing up, we almost always lived in town but the country was never far away,” Ben explained about his childhood. “I spent my weekends at my grandparents. My grandparents had a big farm. My brothers and I, Saturday morning, we would get up and watch cartoons and eat breakfast and then we were out the door and gone until sundown.”
Erin had a similar experience when she was younger.
“When I was growing up, my parents house sits on about 40 acres,” she explained. “I grew up digging int he backyard, I was obsessed with dinosaurs and I was always looking for fossils and I had an arrowhead collection. But things like that are thing our girls aren’t able to do.”
The Napiers Want Their Daughters To Experience Nature
Not only do the Napiers want their girls to play outside, but they also want them to have the space to do so.
Ben said it was important to have “a place in the country where we can say, ‘Go outside. Do whatever you want.'”
“And then when they come inside at the end of the day, I want their hair to be tangled and I want the bathwater to be dirty,” Erin added.
The country home is going to serve as their vacation home.
“It’s because, to us, being on vacation is just being away from technology and work,” Erin said.
Ben noted that their place is “right outside of Laurel.”
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Ben Napier Tears Up Over His Daughter, Helen, in New Video